2006 American Library Association election will offer improved delivery of ballots
Contact: Mark Gould
Director, PIO
312-280-5042
mgould@ala.org
For Immediate Release
November 8, 2005
2006 American Library Association election will offer improved delivery of ballots
CHICAGO – Nov. 8, 2005 – The American Library Association (ALA) will hold its 2006 online election with an emphasis on improved delivery of member ballots.
“We are pleased with the growth of interest in online voting,” said ALA Executive Director Keith Michael Fiels. “For the 2006 election, we have made enhancements to the delivery of the ballots to members, including a 48 hour e-mail blast to Web voters, five-day delivery of international ballots, and a new e-mail address.”
For 2006 elections, all Web voters will receive ballots between March 15 and March 17, 2006, in a 48-hour e-mail blast. This will ensure that voters have more time to cast their ballots.
International ballot packages will be mailed between March 15 and March 22, 2006. ALA will be using a carrier who ensures five-day delivery to anywhere in the world.
ALA also has a new election e-mail address. It is now
2006election@alavote.org. This change to a dot.org from a dot.net will make it less likely that any ballots will be incorrectly identified as spam.
Building on the association's experience with the 2005 electronic election, a number of changes made last year will continue with the 2006 election process and ballot. The 2006 election will be ALA's third online accessible election. The 2006 ballot meets all applicable W3C accessibility standards and can be read by common screen readers for the disabled. This allows ALA's visually impaired members to navigate Web sites by converting text and other visual symbols to audible speech.
This election, council candidate biographies will be available in HTML format for members to review and print before entering the ballot package. A link to these will be provided on the election ballot log-in page.
Finally, this year there will continue to be a long period between the last date for requesting a paper ballot (from October 3, 2005 to March 3, 2006) and the last date for returning the ballots (April 24, 2006 at 11:59 p.m. CST). Paper ballots will be sent to members in good standing who request them prior to March 3, 2006, by calling 800-545-2433 (press 5) or sending an e-mail to
membership@ala.org.
Members who do not have an e-mail address at home or work, but wish to vote online may want to consider signing up for a free e-mail account from a service, such as Yahoo (http://mail.yahoo.com). To ensure that member e-mail records are accurate, ALA conducted e-mail tests in October 2005. Members who change their e-mail addresses prior to January 31, 2006, can update their information by visiting
http://www.ala.org/profile, calling 800-545-2433 (then press 5), or e-mailing
Membership@ala.org (Please state on the Subject Line “update my e-mail address”).
All current ALA members are eligible to vote in the 2006 election. Polls will open on March 15, 2006.
